The Roundhouse shrouded in darkness on a recent night. Now that the 60-day session is over, it’s still unclear what the Cicero Institute was trying to get from lawmakers when it hired two veteran lobbyists, and the city of Albuquerque, which is also a client for one of them, defended its process for vetting lobbyists and identifying their potential conflicts of interests. (Photo by Patrick Lohmann / Source NM)
The legislative session is over and hundreds of bills are closer to becoming law, but it’s still unclear which of them a billionaire-backed think tank influenced when it hired two veteran New Mexico lobbyists.
The Cicero Institute is a Texas-based, conservative think tank established by Joe Lonsdale, the billionaire co-founder of data mining and defense tech company Palantir. The institute has been linked to legislative lobbying efforts in other states where lawmakers have made it a misdemeanor to camp in public, including Texas and Florida, in moves designed to crack down on visible homelessness…